


What Doesn't Kill You Hurts Like Hell

by TrishaCollins



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Adam does not want to be here, Angels are assholes, Bored Angels, Brotherly Love, Build a Better Mouse Trap, Current Torture, Escape Plans, Future Torture, Hunters always have full pockets, M/M, My kingdom for a welding torch, Occasional Sillyness, Other, Past Torture, Sam Doesn't Want to Be here either, Star Wars Refrences, The Cage, The Darkness Might not be much better, Theology, Winchester Luck, non-con
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-23
Updated: 2016-10-01
Packaged: 2018-08-16 22:52:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 8
Words: 7,824
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8120695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TrishaCollins/pseuds/TrishaCollins
Summary: Adam and Sam are stuck in the cage with two angels who are supposedly infallible (really they're not) on the edge of the abyss containing The Darkness. Pondering of what life really means, movies retold as bedtime stories, escape plans and categorizing how many different ways the two Archangels can come up with to kill them. It's never a dull moment in hell,  except when it is. And then the Winchester luck kicks in. What's the worst that can happen?





	1. Pondering The Abyss

Staring into the void surrounding the cage was like staring at one of those optical illusion paintings.

Sometimes your mind saw a sailboat in the pattern, sometimes the void looked like faces.

One particular face, actually. Always the same person. He had never asked Sam if he saw her, and Michael was at best unconcerned about the fact that he may or may not be seeing things.

He could hear voices sometimes too. Or one voice, repeating little whispers over and over again.

A part of him assumed it was just the natural progression of being locked in a cage with two psychopaths and his older brother for way too many years to count, but another part of him wondered if there was really something out there.

It wasn't like he could ask Michael, and he never seemed to see her in the few times that Michael looked out into the void, so he might be the only one who was seeing a woman in the void.

"You probably shouldn't put your arms out there." Sam said quietly behind him.

He shifted to look at him, forehead still against the bars and arms linked between the bars. "What's the worst that could happen?"

Sam rubbed his arm, looking thoughtful for a few moments before he flashed a smile. "Never mind then." Sam settled down next to him, joining him in his observation of the darkness beyond the iron bars.

It was a cold day in hell today. It seemed to vary, either the air caught in his throat and his lips chapped quickly or his skin was burned.

Day and night, as hell went, were extreme and uncomfortable. But it was hell.

"You know how back before people would use "A cold day in hell" as "That's impossible and never going to happen"?" He asked, trying to catch the shape of her face in the nothing again.

"Yeah." Sam responded, still rubbing his arm. There was a fading redness, which he was sure meant Lucifer had been having his "fun" with Sam again. He didn't ask. If Sam wanted to talk about it, he would bring it up himself.

"I wonder what they'd think if they realized?" He mused, and caught her eye as she tilted her head.

He thought she must be listening.

Maybe she was bored.

Maybe she was the guard of Lucifer's cell?

"Would they even believe it?" Sam asked, leaning his arms against the bars but not looping them through.

He wiggled his fingers against the bars of the cage, wishing the gaps were wide enough to slip through. He talked to the void, maybe she would be nice enough to at least dump him somewhere less unpleasant than here.

"Probably not. People believe angels are benevolent, after all."

Sam cracked a small smile. "They just had a really good publicist."

"Yeah and they avoid people, so there's a lack of personal experience." He retorted. "I mean really, even Zachariah was a dick when he was trying to recruit me. Their nice is a little uncanny valley." He had been stupid, and desperate, and that had been used to use him.

Water under the gaping maw of nothing, now. But he knew it, regardless.

It wasn't like Michael would let him forget. He was the unwanted Winchester, the one who had been hidden away and not acknowledged. His brothers hadn't wanted him, his father hadn't wanted him, his mother hadn't known what he was. The spare, useful, but imperfect. Not Michael's chosen vessel.

The undesirable third son, destined for nothing but death.

"They're not all bad. Gabriel was a decent guy. Cas has his moments, but he's largely on the up and up."

He tilted his head to the side, staring at Sam. "It's weird hearing you talk about angels so casually."

Sam grinned. "You get used to it. The weird - after awhile, normal seems weird."

He chewed on the inside of his lip. "I guess it's always been weird for you and Dean." He wondered if John had done him any service, protecting him like he had.

It hadn't helped in the end, or for the second time. The first time he had died, the second time he had gotten body jacked in Dean's place.

"Yeah." Sam sounded a little sad, one hand dropping to his shoulder and squeezing gently.

He grimaced to show he wasn't really moping, but Sam could pretty well see through him at this stage. "I wish he had cared enough to teach me."

"He cared enough to leave you alone, to give you a chance at normal, Adam." Sam responded softly, as though they hadn't tread and retreaded this ground a dozen times now.

"That worked out really well for everyone, Sam." He responded with a small sigh. "I just...I don't know. I go around in circles trying to figure out how I could have avoided this." There she was again, closer now, body less form and more impression in the void.

It was fascinating to watch her almost form and then vanish again into the darkness.

"I do the same thing." Sam admitted quietly. "If Dean and I had been faster, if dad had left something to indicate that you and your mom were there, if not with us, then at least with Bobby. He knew better, I know he did. You hunt enough and what goes spook in the night follows you home. It happens. There should have been something in place, some protocol other than a cell phone call, to make sure you and your mom were safe."

He closed his eyes, and knew she had become formless again. "It's done. I guess. There's nothing left but to try to get ourselves out of this without becoming like Schrodinger metaphorical cat or going completely insane." If they weren't already, he was projecting his feelings onto an optical illusion and he and Sam were both talking about how righteously fucked up the angels they were currently trapped with were.

"We'll figure something out." Sam said quietly, though it lacked the confidence it had held when they first arrived.

"I would do just about anything for a welding torch right now. Or some wire cutters. It's just meant to hold angels, right? So we're just...bonus material. Like the tracks nobody watches on DVDs. So if we slipped out, nobody would notice."

Sam looked down at the void. "Where would we go? I think we'd just start falling."

He looked up. "There has to be chains or something holding this thing to the rest of hell. There is a rest of hell, right? It's not just this one bit?"

"There's a rest of hell. But I am not sure how well we'd do there."

He screwed up his face. "But people could reach us there, right? Your friends. You said Castiel hauled Dean out of hell once. So they could do that again if we could get to hell proper."

Sam nodded thoughtfully, appearing to consider it.

She was a form again, eyes staring at him from the darkness. Eyes of darkness? For a figment of his imagination, she looked nothing like anyone he had ever seen before.

"So we just need to make a hole big enough for the two of us to slip out, and then...climb. A lot."

Sam chuckled. "How good were you in gym?"

"Fine, but I think this is going to burn worse than you average rope climb." He stiffened at the sound of footsteps behind them, and a sing songy voice calling for Sam.

The animation drained out of Sam's face.

"If he's looking for you, then..." Michael would shortly be looking for him.

Sam nodded. "Run."

He drew his arms back into the bars, feeling for just a moment like something on the other side had pressed against his hands. He ignored the sensation, bolting for the twisting corridors that made up this part of Lucifer's hell.

Escape for good fell way behind trying to avoid Michael here.


	2. Girl in a swing

The thing about hell was that it tended to use his own mind against him. Physically, he knew the cage wasn't as vast as it seemed. But it could look like anything.

It could look like the elementary school he had attended as a kid, it could look like the creepy old house where the old man lived alone that everyone in his school had been sure was haunted. It could look like his old house, like the backyard where John had taught him to throw a ball and where he had waited, feeling foolish, for hours on his birthday the year he now knew that John had died, waiting for his father to come.

He had stopped playing baseball after that, had focused instead on following in his mother's footsteps. Had shelved the desperate desire for his father's approval in favor of distaine.

What sort of father only came to see their kid every few months, anyway? John had been a phantom in his life, not a real father.

Hell could take all of those things, twist them, invert them, and play them back for him like a song on repeat.

He hadn't found the skip button yet, or a way to change the song.

Stupid metaphor, he'd carried it too long. He could feel it straining as he pushed against it, staring at Her, sitting in the swing in his backyard, dressed in a white dress, the picture of innocence.

She didn't belong here.

He didn't know much about anything. Angels, demons, anything. Sam could recite more things blackout drunk than he knew about the other side of the world. But he knew she didn't belong here.

"I thought you would be happy." She mused, tracing her fingers over the ropes.

"This is hell." He told her, voice flat. "Nobody is allowed to be happy here."

She laughed, and the sound settled in his stomach oddly, the prickle of unease that always told him when Michael was about to go nuclear sliding in pinpricks up his arms. "I'm not going to hurt you, Adam."

He shoved his hands into his pockets. "Anything that knows my name without be telling it probably plans on doing something to me."

She closed her eyes, angling her head back so her slender neck caught the light. "I like your brother's stories."

He grunted, flopping to the grass, picking at it with his fingers. "That's something to talk to Sam about."

She laughed again. "I thought I would talk to you instead. It's been so long since I have had anyone to talk to. I think you know something about older brother's and betrayal. Dean left you to take his place, after all?"

"It was an accident." He responded, looking at the grass.

"I was thinking about cutting the chains that hold this cage to hell." She said, smiling. "I think it might draw my brother's attention, don't you?"

"Would it destroy them?" He asked, curious.

"Probably." She responded, tilting her head. "You're not afraid to die."

He rubbed his hands over his pants. "I died once. For real. I was with my mom. I was at peace. Death isn't that scary. Here..."

She leaned forward, catching his chin with a fingertip, though he swore she had been further away. Too far to reach him. The face was all girl, young, barely in her teens. But the eyes were wrong.

The eyes made him sure it was a lie.

"You want peace."

He nodded, looking at his hands, breaking her gaze.

"Hm." She brushed fingers through his hair, and just like that was gone, leaving him sitting on the grass of a place that only existed in his memory.

"Adam." Michael's voice was harsh behind him. "Hiding again?"

He shivered before he could stop himself, keeping his gaze down so as not to challenge Michael further.

Michael was in a mood today, Lucifer must have won another argument, or at least rendered his younger brother speechless.

A part of him wanted to beg for it to not happen here, in the shadow of his old house, but he knew Michael wouldn't listen, and didn't resist as he was dragged to his feet and thrown at the back door of his house.

He kept his body as relaxed as he could, trying to keep the pain at bay for as long as he could.

Michael dragged him into the kitchen, pulling one of the knives from the block and burying it in the soft flesh of his hand.

He screamed, because the pride it took to hold it back was worth nothing, and the pain was so raw that he had to.

He screamed again when Michael used another to impale the other hand, and kept screaming until Michael cut out his tongue.

The first time Michael had done that, he had choked on his blood and died before the angel got much further. But as he was categorizing how much it hurt to die in certain way, Michael seemed to be making an internal list of how to keep him alive for longer.

So there was heat involved now, cauterizing the wound. He was kept from losing too much blood by viscous swipes of Grace to close injuries.

Lucifer might have more experience torturing humans, but Michael was a quick study, and seemed to relish the chance to make his big brother proud.


	3. It might not kill us

"Adam?" Sam's voice was soft above him, lacking the little twist that Lucifer couldn't help but put into it.

He opened his eyes, looking up at his brother, keeping his arm pressed to his stomach. The injury was gone, but the echo of the raw, searing pain was still there in his mind. "Hey, Sam." He whispered.

Sam sank down next to him, brushing fingers through his hair. It was wet, sweaty. Hot say in hell, that meant tomorrow would be a cold day, whenever it arrived. "You ok?"

He grimaced. "Ok enough. Michael healed me." Grace stung, burning through him like the worst sort of fever. He would rather Michael let the Hell knit him back together, and Michael knew that.

Michael was an ass.

Sam grimaced in return, one side of his face a bit slower to take the expression. "Lucifer too. "For your service" He said." Sam rolled his eyes a bit. "Ass."

"Some things run in families. Eyes, hair, jaws, sadistic tendencies." He tilted his head a little bit, staring beyond the bars.

Sam grinned down at him, still stroking his hair. "You still burning?"

"I can't tell if its hot down here or if I am having a hot flash. It seems a bit early for menopause, right?"

Sam sighed at him. "At least your sense of humor is intact." Sam shifted him a little bit, resting his top half on his lap. "Shoulders?"

"Yeah. Felt like he was trying to rip me apart with his grace." He was jealous of Sam, for being able to handle Lucifer so easily, when it always felt like Michael was scorching him from the inside out.

"Probably was. Seems tactically unsound." Sam was rubbing his shoulders, gentle circles of strong fingers at the points where he knew Michael hurt him the worst.

He closed his eyes, trying to make himself relax. "Is it a hot day?"

"Not really." Sam responded, voice gentle.

"If his grace starts leaving me feverish all the time, I'm jumping into the void." He grumbled, without heat.

Sam snorted. "Then you would just be falling forever."

"Sounds a lot better." He groaned when Sam found one of the knots on his shoulder, rolling a little to let him get at it. "Where'd you learn to do that?"

"Dad." Sam said quietly. "But Dean, mostly. We'd get banged up on hunts and he'd need icy hot and a lot of hot showers to get the knots out. Didn't always have time to stop for showers."

He hummed, keeping his eyes closed as Sam worked him over. There had been a time when he wasn't in pain all of the time, but it seemed like a long time ago.

"How's the finding a gap in the bars going?"

He thought about mentioning the girl on the swing, but he didn't. "Still looking. It helps when I can find the edge reliably. Lucifer enjoys his mazes."

"This is the most entertainment he's had in Eons." Sam said with a little sigh.

"So what you're saying is we need to get him a cable subscription and he'll be fine?" He whimpered when Sam found a nasty knot on his neck, screwing up his face. "Maybe a few porn vids?"

Sam was quiet for a few moments, working his neck over. Something cracked and it felt like there was a sudden release of tension. "That help?"

He groaned in response, burying his face against Sam's knee.

There's a girl out there. He should tell Sam, tell him about the girl he saw in the void, the girl on the swing. The person Michael didn't seem to see.

But it seemed like something that would bring up more bad times, the echoes of Zachariah and his own poor judgement. And he was a coward.

Nothing bad had happened yet.

Maybe nothing bad would.


	4. There are only two Adams

He arched a little bit to try to save his shoulders, flexing his fingers against the plaster. It was wet, his blood mostly, though the torrential downpour outside had dampened it as well.

Funny how even in hell certain rules had to be followed. Blast a hole into a roof and there would be wet plasterboard to contend with later.

It was wet enough to give slightly under his nails when he flexed his hands against it. Though Michael didn't like it when he moved his hands.

Which meant he kept doing it, and the furious angel kept threatening fractures with the pressure he was putting on his wrists.

Michael licked his throat - the blood, there, gathering like on his skin. His back was probably two flayed lines of open skin, Michael had used his wings against Lucifer, that always seemed to open his back up.

Michael thrust his hips forward, pinning him further against the wall with the crush of flesh against flesh.

Probably looked like a porno pose. Someone had to get off on two bloody men fucking each other against a home improvement project that was going to have to happen.

Seemed like a niche kink, but he was sure it was someone's.

Michael lapped at his shoulder, and a laugh bubbled up in his throat, warring against head trauma and exhaustion and pure, undiluted hatred. "What, are you a vampire now? Do angels crave human blood like humans crave Demons?"

Michael snarled against his shoulder, biting down on it roughly. He chewed the skin with teeth not meant for it, tearing it away. "You assume you would be half as satisfying to such as we." He snarled against him once he had swallowed, bringing their hips together in a burning, rough joining that made his fingers twist against the soaked plaster.

"So we're like angel junkfood." If anything, that thought made him laugh harder. "Can't get enough. It's like Angel fast foot, quick, cheap and entirely addictive."

Michael seemed briefly unnerved by his laughter, pulling away.

He couldn't stop giggling, dipping his fingers into his own blood and advancing on the angel, smearing it on his face. "Gluttony. Six sins, Mikey. Or should we count the fact that you haven't tried to escape this cage in _decades_ number seven?"

Michael batted his hand away, narrowing his eyes. "What is wrong with you." The way he said it made it sound more like an accusation than a question.

He slipped on plaster mud, going to his knees before the angel, drunk on the rain and the head trauma. He laughed again, spreading his hands out to his side. "Well you're my fucking guardian angel, you tell me."

For a moment, it seemed like he had won, the angel was staring down at him like he was a strange creature and Michael had only just realized he might be dangerous.

The rain was sticking his hair to his face, it was making the plaster red with his blond, and muddy because it was fucking plaster and someone should really call the repairman before the hole in the room got much worse.

He stared up at Michael, teeth bared in a grin he didn't feel, body shivering with small giggles that he couldn't seem to quell.

Michael was still, wearing his father's borrowed face like an ill-fitting mask. "What is wrong with you?"

He laughed. "Just you, Michael. Just you. You're everything wrong with me now." He tried to make his legs work, but he only slipped again, sprawling on the ground at Michael's feet.

The angel - his angel, his master - took a single step back, staring down at him with an air of such confusion he couldn't help but laugh harder.

Hell was messing with him, he was just seeing a thing that wasn't there. Was Michael there? Was Lucifer? Was Sam? Was this his own private hell, tearing him apart until there was nothing left to knit back together.

Michael took another step back, snorted once, derisive, and vanished.

He watched the place where Michael had been until his battered, bleeding body finally gave out, and he lost consciousness.

The rain was gone when he woke up, though he was still laying in wet, bloody plaster.

The girl was there again, staring down at him thoughtfully, her dark eyes empty of all expression. "Why do you fight him?"

He blinked up at her, tongue feeling too large in his mouth. "I don't."

She crouched down, brushing a fingertip down his nose. "You fight him with your words. Why do you do that?"

He closed his eyes. "I guess...I guess to remind myself I'm alive. If I just shut up and let him have everything he wanted, I'd be dead."

She made a confused noise. "No you wouldn't."

"Not literally. Just...inside...me. The human part of me. It would be gone." He tried to clarify.

"No it wouldn't." He risked opening his eyes to look up at her, she looked as puzzled as she sounded.

"It's a human thing. Which I am guessing you are not." He tried, feeling lame.

"Your brother fights with his whole being. You fight with your words, with your emotions. I find it curious."

"I don't know how to explain it other than that." He sighed, closing his eyes again. "Sam's been fighting longer than me, I'm still learning how. But I know about giving up, and I know the moment I give up and let Michael win, it's done. He's won for good."

She sighed. "These human things are not very logical."

He laughed again. "Well, live long and prosper I guess."

"Is that a human saying?" She asked.

He laughed. "It's a quote from a TV show. There's this race of aliens that talk a lot like you about emotions and logic. They're called Vulcans."

She seemed to consider that for a moment. "And that is a form of entertainment?"

"Yeah. All 360 channels of TV can for someone be entertaining." He shifted to push himself up. "Guess you don't get Satellite down here, it'd be really poor reception."

She gave him another long look, smoothing her fingers over her dress. "That's a joke."

He tried not to laugh at her. "That's a joke."

"Hm."

He crossed his legs, staring up at her. "So. Who are you?"

"Nothing." She responded. "Who are you?"

He blinked. "Nothing. Ok. I'm Adam."

She tipped her head to the side. "I knew another Adam once."

"Yeah? Was he big on fig leaves?"

She stared at him blankly for a moment. "I don't understand."

He sighed. "Do you know them? The angels?"

She frowned. "Lucifer betrayed me. I know Michael as well. I have watched Lucifer's cage since he was cast down."

Old in the biblical sense, then. Okkkkkkay. "Sorry about that."

She peered at him. "Why? It was eons before you were born, you had nothing to do with it at all."

He sighed. "Yeah but...well, I'm sorry that it happened to you? It sucks being trapped down here."

She stared at him with her dark, empty eyes for a very long time.

He was starting to get uncomfortable when she finally moved, cupping his face. "I like you better than the other Adam." She declared quietly.

"Thanks." He responded automatically. "I don't like the two of them much either."

She smiled. "I do not either, so we shall keep this a secret between us." She pressed a kiss to his forehead, and disappeared.


	5. When All You Have Is A Hammer

It was weird how things in hell felt entirely real. Sam had reclaimed a jacket from somewhere, the pockets stuffed full of hunter crap that he had found or recovered from things Lucifer had created in hell.

He had taken a pack of cards from a drawer in his old house, taken a bible from his mother's bedside - the pocket sized, he doubted she'd ever read it, it was the sort of thing that had a few pieces of scripture and nothing else. It should have been Revelations, Sam had claimed, but it wasn't. It was Mathew.

Hell had no real sense of irony, he supposed. He had taken a picture, too, one of the ones from his mother's bedside of them together.

Had grabbed a jacket from his closet, a hunting knife from the garage.

It was nothing against Michael, he knew that, but it made him feel more comfortable.

The power sometimes worked, but never well enough for them to watch a movie in the maze.

He wished it did. Wished they had that small escape. Books only wrote themselves out as far as he had read them, or Sam had read them. Which meant compared copies of Lord of the flies were either three chapters or read through with bits of it underlined and thoughts scribbled in the margins.

His brother had a bit of a book fetish, he had discovered. One he was beginning to understand after years and years of being shoved into this dingy corner of hell with him.

Sam had taught him what he could, when they could spend a few moments wrestling or throwing a few punches. Or pointing a gun at a target and squeezing off a few rounds.

More often, they spent their free time curled up together, desperate for human touch.

"I can't believe you have watched them enough times to memorize the stories." He complained quietly, as Sam trailed off at the end of an epic retelling of "Jedi". "Watch, we'll get out of here and watch it and you'll be all wrong."

Sam laughed, ruffling his hair. "I liked the movies."

"You and like half of humanity." He closed his eyes to blot out the void that extended beyond the bars.

"Yeah well, me and half of humanity have good taste." Sam's fingers found an itchy spot on his scalp, and he tilted his head slightly to encourage the contact.

"Or half of humanity has good taste and you found one common link." He responded with a grin.

Sam's other hand poked him roughly between the ribs and he laughed, curling up on reflex.

"Rude."

"Sure, Ashley." Sam retorted.

He cracked an eye open. "Full House too? How do you two get any hunting in with watching TV?"

Sam poked him again. "We were kids once too, not much to do while dad was on a hunt but watch TV."

"My mom would have skinned me." He replied, half draped against Sam's arms. "Eight o'clock bedtime until I was 13, even when she had night shifts. No more than an hour of TV a day on weekdays. She was tyrannical."

Sam fluffed his hair. "Your mom was a good mom. John was...trying. Sometimes. When he remembered." Sam grimaced. "Mostly he was an alcoholic out for revenge. It wasn't really much of a life for a couple of kids. Dean was more parent to me than dad was."

"So who parented Dean?"

Sam shrugged. "Bobby, some. Other hunters, though dad kept us away from them when he could. Mostly Dean looked after us. Dad was really hard on him."

That explained a lot, he thought. Even just being around Sam and Dean together for the little while he had meant he had seen it. Zechariah had called them codependent.

Dean raising Sam made that all make sense.

His father had not been a good father for any of them, had he?

"What do you think we'll turn into?" He asked quietly, still pillowed against his brother.

"Maybe we'll just stop being." Sam suggested, sounding disturbingly hopeful. "Our souls are mortal, after a point...I guess they'll just sort of fade."

Not existing did not sound as terrible as his current existence. Hell was not anywhere near the top of his vacation list. "I saw a girl."

"Mom or first kiss?" Sam asked, voice quiet.

"Neither. She said her name was Nothing." He grimaced. "I get the impression she's super old. She said she knew them." He waved vaguely outward, indicating the cage. "And she knew another Adam. She's a bit...hm." Creepy? No. But that might be his new threshold for fear. She had been a bit odd, but he had never felt afraid. "A bit weird, I think? She's kinda low on emotions, or understanding them."

"Angel?" Sam asked.

He shrugged. "I don't know how to test for the divine, Sam."

Which started a new lesson, one on Devil's Traps and Enochian symbols - some of which were apparently etched into his ribs, lovely. He guessed he should be saying thank you to the esteemed Castiel. Another thing for his to do list if he ever got out of hell.

By the end of the 'day' his hands were chafed and sore from writing the symbols down again and again, until his script satisfied his drill Sargent of an older brother. 

He guessed you could send Sam to hell, but even Satan couldn't take his studies out of his head.


	6. Numb

There was very little to do in Hell some days.

Sam, who had apparently never seemed to abide by "free time", seemed to think that it was an excuse to teach him what he thought John should have taught him.

Even on days Michael was moping on the proverbial cloud, he could end up with bruised ribs or sprained muscles. Sam loved teaching. Sam loved teaching him, though he guessed if there had been anyone else here without the self defense skills Sam thought they needed to have, he'd have gone all training montage on them too.

"I think you should have been a gym instructor." He complained, rubbing his shoulder and swinging his arm to try to get feeling back in his arm. "You would have been a lethal football coach."

Sam laughed, lifting a hand to rub his face. "I always wanted to teach history." He responded, a little bit wistful.

"All guy teachers gotta teach a sport, right? So you could have done both."

Sam laughed a little bit, a little sadder now. "Guess I could have. But you were going to be a doctor."

He shrugged a little bit, still loosening up his shoulders and working the cramp out of his hand. "Yeah. I was premed. Before, well, everything." He grimaced at Sam. "Lot of if then maybes for both of us, huh? Who knows if I would have even passed, or if you could have kept yourself from grabbing the school bully in a headlock."

The smile was a bit more genuine now. "Ready to go again?"

He nodded, shifting into the stance he had been drilled into, readying himself for Sam to make the first move.

It wasn't until after Sam had successfully pinned him again that he realized Lucifer was watching them, perched on one of the rocks like an unholy scarecrow with a smirk on his borrowed face.

"Well, well, Sammy, you teaching your baby brother to defend himself? Bit late for that now, don't you think?"

Sam let go of him quickly, backing away a few steps. There was clear dread on his face, now.

He was slower getting up, watching the devil warily. The abject fear had faded some time ago, he wasn't sure how much. Lucifer was unpredictable, but in some ways less sadistic than his younger brother. "What, you don't get bored?" He asked sourly, only to get shushed by Sam.

"I do get bored, Adam. Good question. Look at your big brother trying so hard to protect you." Lucifer tilted his head. "Funny thing, isn't it, having them after so long being an only child? Well, I guess you and Dean didn't have much time to bond. But you and Sammy, well. How long has it been now? Fifty years? Seventy five? I'm sure you've forgotten more about Sammy here than Dean ever knew."

His breath hitched a little bit in his throat.

"Are you just watching or are you going to do something?" Sam asked gruffly, moving to stand between him and the demon.

"Well, Sammy, didn't your mother teach you manners?" Lucifer grinned. "I was asking Adam here a question. Great name, by the way. Did your father pick it? First son in a new family, I guess it fits. He might have eventually forgotten about you and Dean, retired even. Dropped off the map, he was already doing that, wasn't he? Sneaking off to have a slice of normal he wouldn't let you or Dean have. Do you think you could have stood in the way if dear Kate had given him another son? Or a daughter? Fresh start for daddy-o." Lucifer was looking at Sam, watching him over Sam's shoulder, grinning without stop.

So this was how Satan killed boredom. Great. Angels, man. He was getting sick and tired of angels.

Sam closed his hands into fists at his side.

"Don't let me interrupt, boys. I was enjoying watching Sammy here manhandle you, Dea-Adam. Easy mistake to make." Lucifer crossed his arms, staring Sam down. "Or I guess I could help Adam practice, couldn't I Sam? He's never going to believe he's in any real danger from his beloved big brother, the one who tells him bedtime stories and pets his hair when his head is hurting."

He hunched his shoulders a little, trying to keep the shiver internal.

"That's fine. I think we've got this." Sam responded, tense.

"Do you, Sammy?" Lucifer shifted forward, and Sam flinched back a step. "Have you "Got this"?"

Sam shifted back a step, all these years in hell and there was still part of them both that flinched away from the suggestion of pain.

He thought maybe when he went numb, he would finally be allowed to die. To fade away.

But it was only a theory, and he wasn't there when Sam's eyes went black, and his brother turned to face him.

He definitely wasn't there yet.


	7. Brothers In Hell

"Get up, Adam." Lucifer said in a singsong voice, his boot caught him roughly in the ribs.

He rolled with the energy of it, stretching his jaw to try to align the broken bones before they healed incorrectly.

He moved to push himself up and Lucifer kicked him again, knocking him back down to the ground.

"Get _up_ , Adam." Lucifer repeated, Sam's voice mocking and wrong as he twisted it to his purpose. "Such a lazy Winchester."

His mouth was full of blood, breath raspy from the constant, tireless abuse of his body. Lucifer would call out instructions to him from time to time, maintaining the illusion that he was merely continuing Sam's instruction.

He drew a hitched, sobbing breath into his lungs, and went to push himself up again, only to find Lucifer's foot pressed down between his shoulder blades, pinning him helplessly to the ground.

"You see, little brother, in a fight your opponent will never let you regain your feet." Lucifer said cheerfully. "Isn't it cute how the humans struggle?"

Michael's voice was dry in response. "I don't find these creatures "cute", brother. Merely annoying."

Lucifer moved his foot, he braced himself, trying to keep from curling up in anticipation of the next kick. When it didn't come, he looked up, confused and terrified that maybe Lucifer had come up with a new game.

The devil laughed. "You see, Michael, you have to let them have a little bit of hope." The next kick caught him in the face, and knocked a tooth out.

He whimpered, but immediately moved to push himself up again.

"Without hope, there can be no true suffering. That's where you always fail him."

He managed to get to a crouch this time before Lucifer knocked him back down.

"So doggedly persistent. Winchesters." Lucifer said cheerfully with Sam's voice. "Even when they can't possibly win, they fight."

"It makes them annoying."

"It makes them entertaining." Lucifer corrected his little brother, tone patronizing. "Really, Michael, what have you been doing while I was gone? Polishing your sword?" Lucifer cackled. "I imagine that might be a little racy for you, so pure and _good_ as you are."

He scrambled to regain his feet, hoping this didn't turn into a game of torment the human between the two of them. One was enough.

Lucifer watched him scramble to his feet, waited until he had shifted into some approximation of a defensive stance, and then knocked him down again with a little laugh. "Humans are by nature survivors. Stubborn, ill focused creatures."

He rolled onto his back and stayed there for a few moments, struggling to catch his breath through ribs that were still healing from bad breaks.

Lucifer stalked over to him. "Giving up already?"

"Catching my breath." He responded sourly, through pants for air.

"There's my boy." Lucifer grabbed him by the hair, dragging him to his feet. "They talk back so effectively. Can't stop themselves."

Michael was sitting on one of the rocks, watching them with an impassive stare. He made no move to rescue him or to reclaim him, as he had occasionally done in the past when Lucifer made a move on "his" territory.

"Wassmatter, Mikey, still sour at me for calling you a demon?" He asked, before he could stop himself.

Michael scowled at him. "Be quiet."

"Oh ho, did you? Please do tell. I'm all ears." Lucifer said, hand still twisted in his hair.

It was probably a bad idea. It was something Sam might have done, decades ago, when they were newly in the cage.

It was not something he should even be considering, dangling from Lucifer's grasp like a disobedient puppy, unable to support his own weight because the devil kept knocking his feet out from under him.

Hell was built of bad ideas and good intentions.

He closed his eyes, drew a small, tired breath, and then turned him gaze to the devil. "He's been following your example lately. Pretty sure he's managed to espouse all of the Seven Deadly Sins."

Lucifer flicked his gaze to Michael. "Is that so, little brother? I'm so proud of you."

He sounded it too, smug and oozing, patronizing.

Michael looked like he had swallowed something rotten.

Lucifer held him up like a prize. "Would you like to have this meat for a few rounds? I'm sure it would make you feel better."

Michael narrowed his eyes, looking torn for a brief second before he stood from his rock and stalked towards them.

Shit. Well that had backfired horribly. He drew a breath, drawing himself up as much as he could manage without his legs. "See, told you that you should listen to Lucifer more. Nice to know I was right." He mocked, trying to keep his voice from shaking.

Michael froze for half a second, eyes boring into his skull. "You understand nothing." He hissed, and then his grace flooded him, leaving his injuries healed. Michael sneered at his brother, making a dismissive gesture. "Waste your time with the mortals if you will." He snarled, turning away.

He watched Michael go, barely daring to breathe.

Lucifer blinked, head tilted very slightly to the side. "Huh. The kid is learning." The devil dropped him. "Well done, brat."

He choked out a small laugh before Lucifer stomped on his head hard enough that the world went away.

Unconscious or dead, he wasn't sure himself.

***

He woke to Sam's hands on him, though they were shaking.

He sighed a little as he regained consciousness, blinking up at his brother.

"Hey, stay still I'm not sure if all your bones have finished healing."

He mumbled a soft agreement, not trying to rise from his brother's arms.

Sam's face was a mess, blotchy and red, with splatters of blood and gore along his neck and jaw. He didn't seem to care, but it was pretty gross.

He kept running his hands over him, checking ribs and jaw and neck.

"You've got blood on your face." He muttered, muzzy and a little bit out of it.

"Yeah." Sam said, clearly distracted by his repetitive task.

"I think some brain too. S'that my blood?"

Sam nodded, face paling a little bit. "Yeah."

"Huh." That was weird, and his head was still foggy enough that remembering what had happened was going to be difficult for awhile. "Lucifer?"

"Took off." Sam responded, lifting his hand to wipe some of the gore off his face.

"Ok." He said, closing his eyes again.

Sam laughed a little bit, the sound hollow. "That's it?"

"You want me to get mad at you for Satan being a sadist?" He mumbled.

Sam was quiet.

He shifted a little bit, grunted when that hurt a little bit, and accepted Sam's corrections to the way he was laying without complaint.

"I guess not." Sam whispered at last, touching his hair gently. "Just...hate it."

"You get your ass kicked all the time." He complained. "Gotta get my fair share."

Sam sighed. "I wish you wouldn't."

He yawned a bit. "I'm terrible at being the baby brother, Sam. I've got too much experience fighting my own battles." He patted Sam's arm, trying to grin a bit.

Sam shook his head at him. "You remind me of Dean too much in the worst times."

"Thanks." He responded. "I'll take that as a compliment."

Sam mussed his hair, which he thought was as much of an acknowledgement as he was going to get.


	8. The Void

Sam was asleep, arms wrapped loosely around him. They tightened from time to time; occasionally he would wake with Sam’s arms so tight around him that he could barely breathe. 

He had very rarely slept with another person, not since he was a child. But there was something about Sam’s presence nearby, even in hell, which made him feel safer. It made him think about a childhood with two big brothers in the house, people he could have shared his childish thoughts and feels with. 

Things would have been different. He loved his mom, he didn’t resent the life she had given him, but he had to wonder what she would have thought of Sam and Dean. He knew she would have opened her heart to them, to John’s boys who would have barely been boys at that point, and he wondered about the lives they might have had if John had taken that risk. 

He wasn’t even sure if it would have been a risk. 

Maybe it would have been safer for all of them, he was certain that no Ghouls would have gotten to his mom with Sam and Dean regularly checking in. He thought he could have managed to share her with them. 

It was a wasted, wistful thought. A desire for a family that could never be because John would have been never let it be. 

He sighed, curling his arm a bit around Sam’s, closing his eyes. 

Safe or not, tonight – whatever time of day ‘tonight’ happened to be – he couldn’t sleep. Hunger and thirst might be constant complaints, but he had been here decades. They were the least uncomfortable of his discomforts. 

The bed they had found in Lucifer’s maze was comfortable, the blankets were warm in the cold night, and his mind wouldn’t rest. 

It was frustrating. If he didn’t know that moving would wake Sam, he would have gotten up to pace. But Sam slept so rarely that he didn’t want t disturb him as he was managing some rest. It might be fleeting, but it was rest. 

“You want to escape.” Her weight didn’t make the bed shift; she was the elfin child again. Not the woman he sometimes saw in the void around the Cage. 

“Yes.” He responded, automatic. 

She lay her fingers over his hand, studying him. Her skin was cold, but it felt real. “I want to escape.” She mused, thoughtful. 

“So why don’t you?”

“There are keys that hold me in place.” She tilted her head, looking at Sam. “But they are not seals meant to hold my brother’s creations.” 

“Us?” He asked, uncertain. 

She dipped her head slightly in a nod. “Will you help me, Adam?”

He shivered a little bit, unsure. “Maybe? Do you want to destroy everything?”

She turned her hand over, studying her fingers. “I am considering it. But I have not decided yet.”

“That’s not very reassuring.” He responded flatly. 

She nodded. “It wasn’t meant to be.”

He stared at her for a long, long time.

She studied him in return, placing her hands on her own lap. “Even if I free you from this cage, you will need to climb to return to the underside of hell. I cannot carry you.”

He nodded again. “I think we can do that. Can it be worse than here?”

She looked intensely thoughtful. “Perhaps? It is limbo, after all. I suppose you could float forever in a ceaseless void, remembering everything but untouched by anything. It is what the children do.” 

He swallowed past the lump in his throat. “The children?”

“The ones that die without a claim on their soul. They come to limbo, where they are allowed to rest.” Her voice lacked inflection, but seemed thoughtful. 

He closed his eyes. “That’s not creepy at all.”

She sighed. “It was not meant to be. So I suppose that is good.”

“I’m going to teach you about sarcasm someday.” He grumbled, shifting to look at his brother. “Are you keeping him asleep?”

“Yes. I thought he might overreact.” She looked at her hand again. “You should speak to him when he wakes up. I will make a small gap for you.” 

She was gone before he could respond, and Sam sighed behind him, but didn’t wake.


End file.
